Rents at the time were in the 1600 range - I think they are more in the 2000 range now and I bet the houses are closer to $250,000Most of the brand new (under 3 years old) houses on the street were rented to professionals, a Chiefs player who ended up getting cut lived next door.Good Schools, Growing Community, higher end housing, a lot of brand new for rentals. 

At which point he's still only afforded the days of ownership.You could also just have the tenants pay him and have that month rent added to the CD.

I have half the deal. the other half is a group of roth investors all in their 30s prime earning years.. we pay 120k a year in option fee which is 100% credited towards the 5.5 its a long term play we will be in it 20 years or more. before it bears fruit.. but at todays value the property would command about 300 to 400k an acre.. so value when it ripes should exceed 40 million just selling it to Lennar or horton or Lyons homes.. someone that big will be the player.. the massive gain for all these guys in the deal will be tax free to them TRULY tax free.. and each of them only pays less than 10k a year.. so it should be at least a 10X deal with no income tax.. i like these for IRAs  .no cash calls no tenants.. well we lease the land to a farmer.. but that just brings in 25k .. anyway as you get squared away this is something to think about for long term strategies.. there are far more ways to invest than simply trying to buy rentals..

If you are running C/D properties, that will be tougher perhaps.

My plan would be to earn 5% interest on the money in a CD or Bond while I look for another investment opportunity. 

What's the  difference between an A,B,C,D Class and how do I know if the property I'm looking at is in which class?

Del Valle is a completely different play as most of the area has been C/D class until lately with new construction neighborhoods.

first there are various types of auctions.. and some have talked above about Auction companies that are selling homes that are usually poste sherrif sale or trustee sale depending on what you do there in your state.. being back east I am going to assume sherrif.these are Hubzu  Auction .com  bid 4 assets those types of companies.. ( Although Auction is now acting as the crier in  some states and doing sherrif sales.).. so along with public notice the lender on those deals is also jumping on Auctions huge marketing campaigns and I assume with the hope of more competitive bidding.Driving the properties.. the bigger players will have anywhere from 1 to 5 or more people in their org. that does nothing but drive properties estimate repairs if able that type of thing.. then you have @Frank Chin talking about upsets and reserves and other things that are probably germane only to his state.. out here on the West coast.. sale happens you own it..

Granted, I might feel differently if I was renting C-/D class properties. 

Whereas for property insurance, there are very few players in the game for this area so the whole quote is jacked up.